The Times (London)

“ Among the noble cities of the world that Fame celebrates the City of London, of the Kingdom of the English, is the one seat that pours out its fame more widely, sends to farther lands its wealth and trade, lifts its head higher than the rest. It is happy in the healthiness of its air, in the Christian religion, in the strength of its defences, the nature of its site, the honour of its citizens, the modesty of its matrons ”

“ The London year is studded with holidays, blessed little islands of comparative leisure—intervals of absence for good society. Then the wonderful English faculty for “going out of town for a little change” comes into illimitable play, and families transport their nurseries and their bath-tubs to those rural scenes which form the real substratum of the national life. Such moments as these are the paradise of the genuine London-lover, for he then finds himself face to face with the object of his passion; he can give himself up to an intercourse which at other times is obstructed by his rivals. ”

“ The slow growth of the newspaper press from these times is very remarkable. Even so late as sixty years since, a London paper was a very meagre and timid affair. Before us lies a copy of the Times of 1797, insignificant in size and appearance. The small modicum of news is entirely foreign: no brilliant leaders, models of composition—no fearless correction of abuse, or withering sarcasm of folly. ”

“ In this respect the London Times occupies a unique position in the world. It has correspondents regularly appointed everywhere and is probably the only newspaper independent of Reuter, except the New York Sun, which for special reasons has to be. It never prints less than a full page of foreign news, much of it special to itself and most of it telegraphed. It is the only paper, which has continuously scored important “beats” on news of first-class68 international importance. ”

“ The newspaper men here, by the way, both English and American, are disposed to treat us fairly and to be helpful. The London Times, on most subjects, is very friendly, and I find its editors worth cultivating for their own sakes and because of their position. It is still the greatest English newspaper. Its general friendliness to the United States, by the way, has started a rumour that I hear once in a while—that it is really owned by Americans—nonsense yet awhile. ”

“ And that the aforesaid Wardens shall have power to take all manner of hats that they shall find defective and not befitting, and to bring them before the Mayor and Aldermen of London, that so the defaults which shall be found may be punished by their award.
Also,—whereas some workmen in the said trade have made hats that are not befitting, in deceit of the common people, from which great scandal, shame, and loss have often arisen to the good folks of the said trade, they pray that no workman in the said trade shall do any work by night touching the same, but only in clear daylight ”

“ New Squares, and new Streets rising up every Day to such a Prodigy of Buildings, that nothing in the world does, or ever did, equal it, except old Rome in Trajan's time, when the walls were Fifty Miles in Compass, and the Number of Inhabitants Six Millions Eight Hundred Thousand Souls.
It is the Disaster of London, as to the Beauty of its Figure, that it is thus stretched out in Buildings, just at the pleasure of every Builder, or Undertaker of Buildings, and as the Convenience of the People directs, whether for Trade, or otherwise ”

“ C. H. Ray, of The Chicago Tribune, attracted much attention when he exposed the fake correspondents of The London Times. (Incidentally, it may be said that much of the correspondence which appeared in English papers was written in London and was based upon data taken from Union and Confederate news- papers.) The London Times was also criticized in the American press because of the insertion of an item, sent by its New York
correspondent, which asserted that "Lincoln writes English that passes muster in America, but that would not be tolerated in a British school for young men." ”

“ And do you suppose these gentry only get £70 a year for their work, like a curate; or £60, like a sub-lieutenant; or that they have to pay three times those sums for the privilege of belonging to the press, as a barrister does for belonging to his inn? Again, in London at least, there are as many magazines as newspapers, containing every kind of literature, the very contributors of which are so numerous, that they form a public of themselves. ”

“ Not indeed in colonnade and marble halls, not even in a tavern parlour, but in the open air, at the corner of Catherine-street, Strand. There they meet, shouting, squabbling and fighting in hot haste, for they have not much time to lose. All the papers must be posted by six o’clock. Here spare copies of the Herald are exchanged for spare copies of the Daily News, the Times is bartered against the Post, according to the superfluities and necessities of the various traders. The exchanges, of course, are made on the spot, the papers are posted, and the newsvender’s business is over for the day. ”

“ Now the citizens of London are put to a stop in the career of their trade; they begin to fear whom they converse withal, and deal withal, lest they should have come out of infected places. Now roses and other sweet flowers wither in the gardens, are disregarded in the markets, and people dare not offer them to their noses lest with their sweet savour, that which is infectious should be attracted: rue and wormwood are taken into the hand ”

“ On few subjects are the public under more misapprehension than on the absolute and relative circulation of several portions of the London daily press. The greater part of the people would startle were they told that The Times circulates probably under 7,000 a day on an average ”

“ The wealth of the world is wafted to London by the Thames, swelled by the tide; and navigable to merchant ships through a safe and deep channel, for sixty miles, from its mouth to the city; its banks are everywhere beautified with fine country seats, woods and farms....
The government of the city is lodged by ancient grant of the 124Kings of England in twenty-five aldermen, that is, seniors; these annually elect out of their own body a mayor and two sheriffs, who determine causes according to municipal laws. ”

“ The editorial department of the Times really edits the paper, while our German editors only write and select. The former method is evidently for the benefit of the journal, while the latter is more agreeable and profitable to the writers. The system of the Times requires what it would be impossible to find in Germany—the power of enormous capital, a gigantic city such as London is, and English characters, that is to say, men, authors of first-rate talent, who will sacrifice praise and notoriety, and take money in their stead. ”

“ It is sometimes said that in England the London Times owes its position largely to the fact that if any individual grievance is felt it is generally ventilated by a letter to The Times. Whatever may be the organization of the Press for reporting the news of the day, the resources of no newspaper staff are great enough to cover an area of information as large as that represented by its readers; and the value of the outlet for opinion and information afforded by the correspondence columns cannot be overstated. ”

“ In the wish that readers in vaster numbers than usual may peruse the winged words of the illustrious journalist, Mr. Punch offers the freedom of the article to all editors the world over.
The office of The Times is situated in a busy quarter of the great city of London and is built of brick and stone. Light enters the numerous rooms through windows made of glass. Outside is the roar of traffic ”

“ The re [Pg 143] sult of this was that The Times reached Paris with the Indian news from London before the regular mail had reached that city from Marseilles. The next noticeable enterprise of The Times was the sending out commissioners to investigate the condition of the poor and laboring population of London in 1847, an enterprise which was crowned with the moat satisfactory results. The Times has always been the firm friend of the poor, and its columns are always open to the tale of distress. No case is advocated until it has been thoroughly investigated ”

“ Every one who has any thing to say can say it in print, and is sure of some sort of a hearing. A special feature of the time is the multiplication of periodicals. The great London dailies, like the Times and the Morning Post, which were started during the last quarter of the 18th century, were something quite new in journalism. The first of the modern reviews, the Edinburgh, was established in 1802, as the organ of the Whig party in Scotland. This was followed by the London Quarterly, in 1808, and by Blackwood's Magazine, in 1817, both in the Tory interest. ”

“ It has a dense population, said to number 180,000 souls; and is beyond measure commercial, the merchants of the entire kingdom flocking thither, as, by a privilege conceded to the citizens of London, from them alone can they purchase merchandise, so they soon became very wealthy; and the same privileges placed in their hands the government of the city of London, which is divided into 24 trades or crafts, each of which elects a certain individual, styled alderman, the election being made solely in the persons of those who are considered the most wealthy, and the office is for life ”

“ Many of these wrote also for London newspapers, including The Times, The Morning Post, The Daily Mail, The Daily News, The Daily Chronicle, The Standard and The Daily Telegraph. Dr. E. J. Dillon was notable among writers for English newspapers and reviews. For news from the Russian front much dependence was placed on Stanley Washburn, of the London Times, and Stephen Graham, of The London Morning Post. Among notable German correspondents were Karl Rosner of the Berlin Localanzeiger, Baron Karl von Reden of the Berlin Tageblatt, and Max Osborne, of the Berlin Vossische Zeitung. ”

“ The amusements of the people partake of the mutability of all mundane matters, and the newspapers of the period show that the London fairs had begun, at the beginning of the last quarter of the eighteenth century, to be regarded by the educated portion of society much less favourably than they had been in earlier times. ”

“ In times past when any rich men died in London, they were wont to help the poor scholars of the university with exhibitions. When any man died, they would bequeath great sums of money towards the relief of the poor. When I was a scholar at Cambridge myself, I heard very good report of London and knew many that had relief of the rich men of London ”

“ It is a good city indeed when it has a good master.
Of Honour of the Citizens. That City is honoured by her men, adorned by her arms, populous with many inhabitants, so that in the time of slaughter of war under King Stephen, of those going out to muster twenty thousand horsemen and sixty thousand men on foot were estimated to be fit for war. Above all other citizens, everywhere, the citizens of London are regarded as conspicuous and noteworthy for handsomeness of manners and of dress, at table, and in way of speaking.... ”

“ The politics of the Times are an inscrutable mystery to most men, even to the majority of Englishmen; but the simple solution of the mystery is, that the Times either follows the lead of public opinion, or that it contradicts public opinion only when—more far-sighted than its contemporaries—it foresees a change ”

“ The broad thoroughfare, which, bordered with fitting houses, would make one of the handsomest streets in London, is gorged with vile, rotten tenements, occupied by merchants who oft-times pursue the very contrary to innocent callings. Everything is second-hand, except the leviathan gin-shops, which are ghastly in their newness and richness of decoration. The broad pavement presents a mixture of Vanity Fair and Rag Fair. It is the paradise of the lowest of costermongers, and often the saturnalia of the most emerited thieves. ”

“ If we still remain true to ourselves, and resolutely shut our ears to the complaints of these interested and mercenary writers, both at home and abroad, the time will soon come when our people will be saved entirely from all literary drudgery, and even our newspapers be re-publications of London Times' and Chronicles, as some of our Magazines already are of London and Edinburgh and Dublin monthlies. ”

“ The order for the London Times was an extreme test, as the volume is so large that the carriers in the Library connecting with the shelves would not accommodate it, and a messenger had to be sent from the main desk to the top deck of the south stack, where the newspaper files are shelved. ”

“ The appearance presented by the streets of London an hour before sunrise, on a summer’s morning, is most striking even to the few whose unfortunate pursuits of pleasure, or scarcely less unfortunate pursuits of business, cause them to be well acquainted with the scene. There is an air of cold, solitary desolation about the noiseless streets which we are accustomed to see thronged at other times by a busy, eager crowd, and over the quiet, closely-shut buildings, which throughout the day are swarming with life and bustle, that is very impressive. ”

“ Ah, truly, shades of the prison-house close about us, the new-born things, and all too soon do we forget. And yet, when we were new-born we did remember other times and places. We, helpless infants in arms or creeping quadruped-like on the floor, dreamed our dreams of air-flight. Yes; and we endured the torment and torture of nightmare fears of dim and monstrous things. We new-born infants, without experience, were born with fear, with memory of fear; and memory is experience. ”